dandy) I was a member, at the time too of its greatest glory, when
Brummell and Mildmay, Alvanley and Pierrepoint, gave the Dandy Balls;
and we (the club, that is,) got up the famous masquerade at
Burlington House and Garden, for Wellington. He does not speak of the
_Alfred_, which was the most _recherché_ and most tiresome of any, as
I know by being a member of that too."


LETTER 513. TO THE EARL OF B----.

"April 6. 1823.

"It _would_ be worse than idle, knowing, as I do, the utter
worthlessness of words on such occasions, in me to attempt to express
what I ought to feel, and do feel for the loss you have sustained[1];
and I must thus dismiss the subject, for I dare not trust myself
further with it _for your_ sake, or for my own. I shall _endeavour_
to see you as soon as it may not appear intrusive. Pray excuse the
levity of my yesterday's scrawl--I little thought under what
circumstances it would find you.

[Footnote 1: The death of Lord B----'s son, which had been long
expected, but of which the account had just then arrived.]

"I have received a very handsome and flattering note from Count ----.
He must excuse my apparent rudeness and real ignorance in replying to
it in English, through the medium of your kind interpretation. I
would not on any account deprive him of a production, of which I
really think more than I have even _said_, though you are good enough
not to be dissatisfied even with that; but whenever it is completed,